


Cassian Isn't Dead

by Bright_Elen



Category: Alice Isn't Dead (Podcast), Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Truckers, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Anxiety, Canon-Typical Violence, Horror, Kinda, M/M, Mystery, POV Bodhi Rook, POV Cassian Andor, Past Relationship(s), Pining, canon-typical violence for Alice Isn't Dead
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-17
Updated: 2017-09-03
Packaged: 2018-12-16 10:13:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11826606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bright_Elen/pseuds/Bright_Elen
Summary: Bodhi went to therapy. He kept a job and a routine. He spent time with friends. He was doing everything someone grieving their husband was supposed to do. He'd almost gotten his equilibrium back, or what little he'd had, anyway.And then Cassian ruined all that by not being dead after all.So Bodhi did what any grieving, infuriated, loving spouse would do: He got a job as a trucker so he could travel the country searching for Cassian.He didn't bargain on running into a secret war in the process.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to [misskatieleigh](http://archiveofourown.org/users/misskatieleigh/) for bouncing ideas back and forth. :)
> 
>  
> 
> Individual chapters tagged for content warnings.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warning in end notes.

Cassian trudges into the locker room, exhausted after the raid. His combat gear is splattered with blood - some of it his, but most of it thick and black and hardly recognizable as such - and a number of other bodily substances he doesn’t want to think about. 

At least the heather oil overpowers the scent of offal and rot. 

He strips slowly, careful of his wrenched shoulder and the bandages on his forearm. The armor he kicks towards the not-so-affectionately named Stink Sink; the jacket and shirt and fatigues he stuffs down the laundry chute. Someone else will sort that out for him. He probably won’t even get a complaint in his file for destroying equipment, for once. That will be nice. He might even appreciate it once he’s had some sleep.

Cassian hoses the mess off his armor and then dumps it onto the drying rack. He’ll have to go at it again later with a brush, but tonight he’s just too tired. The choke point had worked, had forced Thistle to send in Travelers a few at a time instead of in a mob, but they’d needed hours to take them all out.

Hours that felt like days. Is it even still Monday?

Cassian blinks, shakes himself, and goes to the showers. There’s already a roll of Saran wrap sitting on the bench nearby; Melshi had sustained the worst lacerations of them all and had been sent home early. Whether his teammate had been considerate or just forgetful, Cassian’s grateful as he wraps his arm. He turns the water as hot as he can stand it and just stands in the stream for several minutes, letting the heat sink through his skin and into his abused muscles, into his bones. 

It's the only time he ever feels warm all the way through, these days. Not like before. Not like when he had Bodhi.

_ Shit. _ Normally he’s better at avoiding these thoughts, but when he’s this tired he can’t help thinking about his husband. 

Ex-husband. Both legally speaking and as far as Bodhi is concerned. And Cassian should accept this. It’s the decision he made in the first place, and for very good reasons. He should accept the fact that he and Bodhi aren’t for each other any more.

Most of the time, he does.

But tonight? Now, alone with his thoughts and his injuries after a long day of killing monsters? Now he feels the grief and longing and guilt stronger than ever, all pouring out of his chest through the broken places, and he’s sobbing before he can even try to stop.

Before, he’d have gone home to Bodhi. Whose face lit up when he talked about poker or airplanes. Who kissed Cassian so tenderly, with such a beautiful mouth. Who actually cared about how his day went. Who could talk him through basically any problem. Before, he’d have wrapped his arms around Bodhi and drifted to sleep as the other man carded elegant fingers through his hair. Before, they’d have made love in the morning, Bodhi still too sleepy to be anxious about anything.

But that was before Cassian broke Bodhi’s heart.

Now Cassian has this: a hot shower. Comfort food in the freezer at home. The slightly antagonistic friendship of the most sarcastic tactical analyst in Operations.

The water washes tears from his face as fast as he produces them. 

His heart’s still the same mess it always is.

When he’s too tired even to cry, he finishes washing, put his street clothes on, and gets a junior officer to drop him off a street away from home. He cuts through the neighborhood, gets his key in the door on the fourth try, and collapses onto his sofa as soon as the door is locked behind him.

* * *

The next morning, Cassian changes the bandages on his claw wound, rubs liniment into his shoulder, and take his antibiotics like a good soldier. He has enough energy to do these and fry some eggs, get dressed, take out the trash, tidy the living room. Little things that have been ignored for the last week in preparation for the raid.

He finds himself back in the kitchen, sitting by the window but not really looking out. His CB radio is on the table, and one-handed he cycles up and down the frequencies, just as a way to pass the time. It started as a joke gift from Imwe; of all the cover identities Cassian used, it was as a driver for their shipping company front that he’d met Chirrut.

“-tress on northbound just past exit eighty-nine,” a trucker is saying. Cassian twists the dial again, wondering when Imwe and Malbus will be back from their latest mission. 

“- and I don’t want to even indirectly support human trafficking, you know, so thanks but no thanks.” Cassian stiffens, waits, but the person on the other end signs off without a word, so nothing to feed the FBI there.

Another few frequencies, another smattering of trucker chatter. Cassian is thinking maybe he should do something more productive with his day off, but he keeps twisting the dial.

“- one of those really big truck stops, with a diner and showers and laundry and everything, you know the kind,” says a voice, and Cassian about has a heart attack.

It’s Bodhi. It’s Bodhi’s voice.

How the fuck is this happening? CB radio only has a range of fifteen miles at best, so that means Bodhi’s in town. In Cassian’s fucking town, near a base, and on a CB radio. Is he - is he driving a truck? What the fuck. Bodhi always hated driving.

“It was a little old, run down. Nobody was eating the pie, and that should have been my first clue,” Bodhi says with a chuckle. Cassian turns the volume as high as he can stand. Is that the bravado Bodhi has in his voice just before a panic attack? Jesus, if he’s on the road, that could be disastrous. Maybe Cassian should call an ambulance, another agent, anything to get Bodhi to stop. “Anyway, I was eating my omelette - a little greasy, but not too bad, maybe a bit heavy on the cheese - and this...well, it wasn’t a man. Not really. Reminded me of a zombie, if anything. Had on a filthy polo shirt and baseball hat, no logos or monogram, just the word ‘Thistle’ on them. Weird brand name if you ask me.”

Now Cassian  _ is  _ having a heart attack. Thistle finding Bodhi is high on his list of personal hells. And good God, what is Bodhi doing narrating this story on the radio where anyone can hear him? Can Cassian find him? Stop him, somehow, from talking about the secret war? Maybe get him to go home?

“He -” and here Bodhi swallows. Cassian’s fingers tighten on the edge of the table. “He said he’d come to explain a few things to me. Including death, which is incredibly pretentious, don’t you think? I mean people have infantilized me before but that’s ridiculous. I wasn’t even offended. Well.” He swallows again. “Mostly I was terrified. And even at that point I think I knew it was justified.

“Anyway,” Bodhi continues, “this gross zombie asshole just says ‘watch this’ and goes to another table. Grabs a guy’s arm, then gives him this...I guess it’s a mind-meld stare or something, because the guy just gets up and lets the Thistle man bring him outside. It didn’t look good, that’s for sure, but the thing was, nobody else seemed to have noticed. It’s like I was the only one that could see them.” He takes a shaky breath, then scoffs. “But that’s ridiculous too. This whole thing is like someone just picked monster features out of a hat, I mean honestly.

“I got up and followed, even though I could feel a panic attack coming on. I don’t know what I thought. If the Thistle man could brainwash a guy just by looking, and make everyone in a room not see it, what chance did I have?

“But I went. And outside, right at the edge of the light, the Thistle man…” Bodhi swallows yet again. Takes a deep breath. “He made sure I was watching. Then he took a bite out of the brainwashed guy. Like he was made of candy or something, his teeth just tore through him.” His voice wavers, gets quieter. “It was a lot of blood. I think I screamed, but then I ran back to the truck, too. And now I’m driving away, hoping that thing doesn’t follow me, somehow. I don’t know if it can’t move fast or if it let me go.”

Oh god. Oh god, Bodhi. He’d been so close to Thistle - Thistle might be following Bodhi, god god god - and that’s a horror Cassian thought he’d bought himself immunity from.

Was it all for nothing? Is Bodhi going to be hurt even after the sacrifice Cassian made?

Fists clenching, Cassian finds himself ready to shoot something.

“I don’t know what any of this means. I don’t know why there are monsters, or why one of them let me see him. I don’t know why you’re alive, Cassian,” Bodhi says. It wrenches Cassian’s emotions in yet another direction, his name flying from Bodhi’s lips a lightning bolt. 

Can Bodhi possibly know he's listening? Does he have any idea how close he is? Or is he just venting to the airwaves?

“I don’t know why you,” Bodhi says, voice wavering. He has to pause to take several deep breaths. “Why you faked your death in the first place. That was really shitty, you know that, right? God, I hope you know that.” Bodhi’s voice hitches, and Cassian digs his nails into his palm.

“I know it,” he murmurs. 

“And of all the ways I had to find out, it was your stupid face on TV,” he continues, tone much sharper, though now there’s radio static fuzzing the edges of his voice. The static intensifies as Cassian listens, clutching the table for support, entire being fixated on the sound of Bodhi’s voice. “At first I thought I was just seeing you places you weren’t like I always do, but then it happened three more times. All these disasters, all over the country, and you were there in the background. I don’t get it, Cass. I have no fucking idea. It sucks and I’m--” 

Static swallows up whatever else he’s saying. Then, silence.

Cassian would like to collapse onto the floor and have a quiet breakdown, but instead he notes Bodhi’s frequency, turns the radio off, and tries to think.

Before he gets very far, his phone buzzes. It’s a text from Kay.

_ Going to Starbucks. Meet me there? _

Kay hates Starbucks. It must be something important that he doesn’t want to share with any other agents. Something like, perhaps, Cassian’s ex driving through town and broadcasting motherfucking classified intel. 

Cassian’s hammering pulse slows a little, knowing that he’s going to have Kay’s help.

_ 15 min, _ he types back.  _ Get me a triple-shot venti, I’m going to need it. _

He's still getting his shoes on when his phone buzzes again.

_ You're going to need a lot more than that. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warnings: Blood, body horror, zombie grossness, oblique references to killing monsters, mind control.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warnings in end notes.
> 
> Special thanks to [misskatieleigh](http://archiveofourown.org/users/misskatieleigh/) for beta :)

The only thing Bodhi hears as he runs for his truck is his own breathing. There must be other sounds - he’s in a goddamned Target parking lot, there should be SUV doors closing and kids yelling and exhausted parents scolding them - but he doesn’t register them. Mortal terror can do that to a person.

He claws his keys out of his pocket in a death-grip and manages to get into the driver’s seat and close the door before the Thistle Man or the cop changes his mind about letting Bodhi go. He tears out of the shopping center as fast as a big rig can, which is still dangerous and scary in a suburban parking lot, and doesn’t even stop to put on his seat belt until he’s ten miles down the interstate.

“God,” Bodhi whispers to himself. “God damn.”

When the traffic thins between cities, he pulls over. He wishes he was a thousand miles from that Target, wants to drive until nothing is recognizable, but he’s already surpassed his previous best time in holding off a panic attack. Having one on the road would kill him, and in a truck this size he’d take other people with him.

He cuts the engine and slides onto the passenger seat, and then he lets himself dissolve into a shuddering mess. Instead of reliving what happened back there, he manages to just focus on pure emotions, surrendering control so they can run themselves out. It’s been a long time since he let himself do that; most of the time he uses concrete sensory experiences to pull himself out of an attack but right now he thinks avoiding retraumatizing himself is the most he can do.

So he cries, and nearly hyperventilates, and shudders on the seat, heart trying to beat out of his chest.

He didn’t note the time when he stopped - hadn’t noted it for a while - so when he finally surfaces he has no idea how long he’s spent. He’s thirsty, so he digs out a bottle of stale Dasani from the back. He hasn’t eaten since Missouri, so he finds a granola bar.

After that he just sits. Breathes. Doesn’t really think about anything. When the prospect of caffeine becomes more attractive than not moving, he slides back into the driver’s seat.

Once he’s back on the road, he sets cruise control and picks up the radio.

“So that was awful,” he says to the airwaves. While his voice is as steady as only exhaustion or dissociation can make it, it’s also rough. Given that he survived almost being choked to death by a zombie tonight, he figures he’s earned it. “The Thistle man again, Cassian. He’s been following me. I kept seeing him at rest stops, gas stations. Once even at a delivery. And then he didn’t show up for a few days, I thought maybe I’d gotten lucky and lost him. But he was waiting for me, instead.” Thumb releasing the talk button, he stares out at the road. He lets another few miles pass.

“I went to group therapy back home,” Bodhi says some minutes later, tone conversational. “It was good. Just knowing I wasn’t alone, that was good.

“But the talking...I’m not sure that helped. Not really. We talked like a, a ritual, or a superstition. As if by describing the shape of the monster devouring us we could ward it off. But maybe that’s all it was, just a description; it didn’t change anything. It didn’t bring anyone back.” He sighs. Fishes an apple from where they’re sitting in a paper grocery bag on the passenger floor. He doesn’t bite into it yet.

“Maybe it does help a little. I like talking, you know me. Always have. When I thought you were dead, I talked to you all the time. Hoping that wherever you were, you’d hear me.” He scoffs weakly. “Basically the only difference is that now I talk on the radio, hoping you’ll hear me. Do I have any better chance of an answer this time? Sometimes it feels like it. Sometimes it seems just as futile.”

He lets the radio click off and eats the apple. Kansas slides by outside, flat and dark like the bottom of an empty drawer. A really fucking huge drawer.

Maybe that simile needs work.

“I don’t know how, but he got inside the trailer. I started hearing sounds coming from it, like someone walking around the upstairs apartment. And I pulled over to check. No one was there when I looked. So I went back to driving. But then the whole cycle repeated, the sounds, me pulling over, seeing nothing.

“The third time I heard the noise, I decided to ignore it. I reminded myself that even if the Thistle Man was in there, he couldn’t get to me from the trailer. That I had locked it from the outside. That I had control.”

Bodhi took a sip of water. Flat, straight roads in the dark were the worst. It was like driving on a treadmill. He definitely needed to stop for coffee at the next available opportunity.

“So I decided I’d confront him on my own terms. I picked Target because the parking lots are big enough and there are always a lot of people. I thought that would help.”

He sighs.

“It didn’t help, Cassian. I parked and got out and opened the door. Nobody was there, but I heard a noise from the front of the truck, and after I went to check, the next time I turned around he was there.”

The dashed white lines of the highway pulse through his headlights in a steady rhythm. He knows better than to watch them for too long, lest they put him to sleep.

“The day you supposedly died, the highway patrol officer came to our door at five AM. He had to say it five times before it got through. I just...I couldn’t believe you were dead, Cass. I’d gone to sleep next to you. We were going to meet for lunch.” A flicker of emotion stirs deep in his chest; remembered grief and a newer anger. His grip on the radio tightens, and his voice is sharper with his next words.

“Looking back I guess either your car crash faking was excellent, or he was in on it too. They didn’t have me come down to identify the body, said it was burned beyond recognition. They just assumed - we all just assumed - that the person who died driving your car, on your route to work, was you. It was a reasonable assumption.

“But it turns out that reasonable assumptions don’t work with you, do they? The idea that your husband faked his death is completely unreasonable, but you did. And it’s reasonable to assume that you know your husband well, but I didn’t.” He pauses. There’s more than a hint of anger now, and his anxiety has rested enough to start coming back. “Why the fuck did you do that, Cass? Are you a secret agent? Does the Thistle Man have anything to do with why you left, or is that just another weird thing in my life?”

He pauses to pass a slow-moving pickup that looks like it had last been serviced sometime during the Johnson administration. He’s never voiced the next question out loud, but his doubts aside, giving voice to his darkest thoughts has always made them easier to face.

“If you are a secret agent - and god, that sounds so melodramatic, but I can’t really think of another way to put it - if you are, then...are you the kind who had a secret identity, or are you the Russian sleeper agent kind? I mean, was any of our relationship real, Cassian? Did the person I married really exist, or was that just part of your cover? Fuck, is your name even really Cassian?”

His throat is a little tight, so he takes a sip of water and tries to see the smallest details of the road. Two cars nearby, darkness, the edge of a field. Probably soybeans. Everything’s soybeans these days.

“There in the parking lot, the Thistle Man pushed me against the side of the truck. He smelled like rotten fruit and soil. He pressed his arm against my throat. Told me how easy it would be to kill me. That nobody would care if I died.” And oh, there’ve been so many times Bodhi’s thought the last one himself that it had been both mundane and devastating to hear it from someone else’s mouth.

There was a time when he knew, no matter how anxious he got, that Cassian cared. His husband’s utter commitment had been one of the few pieces of solid ground in Bodhi’s emotional life.

After the last few months of revelation and obsession and truck driving classes, that certainty has been destroyed. Now all he has is a tenuous hope.

“Then he started to actually choke me, but I saw a cop a few rows away, and even though I couldn’t breathe I kicked and scratched and thrashed until I got the Thistle Man off me. I called for help. The cop came over.”

Bodhi’s vision goes unexpectedly blurry and he blinks the moisture away.

“I don’t know what I was thinking. Maybe just that even a cop would take my side if it was against a fucking zombie.” He shakes his head. “He didn’t. He didn’t seem to care that he was standing next to a monster. They’re working together, Cassian. I knew things were bad but I honestly didn’t expect ‘the cops are in league with zombies’ to be a problem.

“I ran. I got back in the truck. And now here I am, talking to you.”

He takes a deep breath.

“The cop told me to go home. That I should stop sticking my nose where it didn’t belong. And you know what? I thought about it. I thought about quitting this job and going back to Yakima.” He runs a hand through his hair, shakes himself to stay awake. “But it didn’t feel right.

“The cop didn’t understand. I’m not sure I understood until now. I might not know when I’ll get there, but I am going home, Cass. Because home isn’t a place. It’s a person. And I’ve survived this motherfucker twice now. I’m not going to give up.

“I’ll find you, Cassian. Wherever you are.”

The radio clicks off in his hand. He lets it sit for a moment, then hangs it back up. He’s said his piece for the night, and there’s coffee at the next rest stop.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Panic attack; physical assault; general road trip horror; police threats.

**Author's Note:**

> If y'all haven't listened to [Alice Isn't Dead](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ln7pWGclAEQ), you're missing out.
> 
> Visit me on Tumblr at [bright-elen](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/bright-elen).


End file.
